Munich, Germany

I chose this hotel to stay in during my stay in Munich.

The woman at the front desk didn’t know any English, so I had a great time trying to communicate with her. It was classic when she said a couple words in English and then finished the rest of her sentence in german like I would just understand it. Not.

I just realized too how it is so cool that I am able to do these kinds of trips at this point in my life. To travel by yourself in countries that speak different languages, etc… I just love it that I can do this by myself (yes, I realize it is a European county, but still). I think it gets easier if you do it a lot though. I remember my first trip that I took by myself (when I first moved to Barcelona) and I was a bit scared, but now I don’t think twice about it.

Getting to Munich was great because as I walked out of the metro (that I took from the airport) it was snowing! I surprised even myself when even though it was really cold and windy, a huge smile grew on my face. I didn’t realize how much I wanted to see snow again. It had been 2 years since I had seen snow the last time. I think snow and I have a cultural connection – it is a part of my life and how I grew up. There is something about how a cultures live with snow and cold winters – we are a special group of people I think.

The weather there in general was really erratic. One minute it would be gorgeously sunny, and then next it would be snowing heavily and really windy. I don’t remember Minnesota weather being like that.

The first night I was there, I met up with a friend – Michael. He lives there, but is from Austria. He has a farm in the Alps and he also owns 3 organic grocery stores in Munich. We had a great night chatting. He drove me around the city in his car, which was nice because it was really cold outside. Then we ate dinner at one of his favorite restaurants – Vietnamese. He had to get home early that night because the next day was the busiest day for grocery stores in the city. The next four days all stores would be closed due to the easter holidays.

The next day I spent the whole day exploring the city. I first went to Marienplatz, the main plaza in munich. I was so happy too because I saw a Galeria department store. I had went to one in Berlin and found these awesome ginger candies. Luckily this store sold them as well. I also bought this awesome smoothy – it was so good. The store (and the whole city) was going easter crazy. I thought these huge bunnies in the store were awesome.

As I walked out of Galeria, I saw this grandmother and her grandson looking at some street performer.

I made my way over to flower/produce market that they city is famous for. Next to the market area Michael had shown me one of the biggest organic grocery stores in Munich called Basic. It also had a restaurant on the second floor, so my plan was to eat there for lunch. Around the market area, I thought it was cute that they made winter hats for their poles for advertising.

There were two cute statues in the market. I wonder who this ida shumacher is and why she is known for having a broom in her hand.

During a brief moment of sun, I took a quick shot of myself.

I saw this sign as well. It seems like only women can walk their children here. Later in Salzburg I think I saw another sign that had a man with a child. Very intriguing.

I was just about to go to Basic for some shopping and a lunch when all of a sudden it started to snow like mad. It was so awesome, well for me.

Basic was cool, I bought a few things. The lunch was pretty good as well. This was the view from where I was sitting on the 2^nd floor.

Then as I walked back to marineplatz it was sunny again. The sky and the buildings look really nice.

Mind you though, it was still very cold and a bit windy. I next took the metro to get to where the Olympics were held there. I asked a man who told me that the tower was located near there.

I went up the tower to get some great views of the city. I saw the Olympic stadium and where the athletes stayed, which was cool. I also saw the BMW museum and factory possibly.

Even though it was super cold, I decided I would walk around the main part of the city to look for the museum of modern art. I really wanted to see a museum during this trip, but it being so cold I wasn’t much into walking outside anymore either.

I finally found the museum, and it was pretty cool inside. I saw some Picassos and a number of other random art pieces. I did like this wall of random items hanging on it. It was lit very cool.

The next day I was planning on seeing a little bit more of Munich, but it was raining basically all morning. So, I decided to just get on the next train to get to Salzburg. Which was a good idea because it turned out that I really like Salzburg a lot better than Munich. Also my hotel in Salzburg was ten times better than the one in Munich.

~ by ronrosenow on March 24, 2008.